Performance, behaviour and meat quality of beef heifers fed concentrate and straw offered as total mixed ration or free-choice
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Autor/a
Iraira, Sergio P.
Madruga, Ana
Pérez-Juan, María
Ruiz-de-la-Torre, José L.
Rodriguez-Prado, María
Calsamiglia, Sergio
Manteca, Xavier
Ferret, Alfred
Fecha de publicación
2015-12-02ISSN
1695-971X
Resumen
Eighteen Simmental heifers were fed concentrate and barley straw offered as a total mixed ration (TMR) or separately as a free choice (FCH) to compare performance, behaviour, and meat quality. The heifers were assigned to treatments in a randomized complete block design. Animals were allotted to roofed pens with 3 animals per pen, and 3 pens per treatment. Intake of concentrate, average daily gain, and gain to feed ratio were not different between diets, being on average 7.6 kg/day, 1.38 kg/day and 0.18 kg/kg, respectively. Straw intake was greater in TMR than in FCH treatment (0.7 vs 0.3 kg/day, espectively; p<0.001). Crude protein intake, neutral detergent fibre intake and water consumption did not differ between treatments. Time spent eating was longer in FCH than in TMR (p=0.001), whereas time spent ruminating and total chewing time were longer (p<0.01) in TMR than in FCH. The number of displacements resulting from competition for feed in the main feeder in TMR treatment tended to be greater than in FCH treatment. There were no differences in the carcass characteristics and quality of meat of animals assigned to the different feeding methods, but the percentage of 18:2 n-6 was higher in FCH treatment. In summary, these results suggest that the use of TMR as a feeding method in beef cattle fed high concentrate diets did not affect performance and increased time spent ruminating with a
potential decrease of ruminal acidosis incidence.
Tipo de documento
Artículo
Versión del documento
Versión publicada
Lengua
English
Materias (CDU)
663/664 - Alimentos y nutrición. Enología. Aceites. Grasas
Páginas
11
Publicado por
Instituto Nacional de Investigación y Tecnología Agraria y Alimentaria
Publicado en
Spanish Journal of Agricultural Research
Citación
Iraira, Sergio P., Ana Madruga, María Pérez-Juan, José L. Ruíz-de-la-Torre, María Rodríguez-Prado, Sergio Calsamiglia, Xavier Manteca, and Alfred Ferret. 2015. "Performance, Behaviour And Meat Quality Of Beef Heifers Fed Concentrate And Straw Offered As Total Mixed Ration Or Free-Choice". Spanish Journal Of Agricultural Research 13 (4): e0610. doi:10.5424/sjar/2015134-8003.
Número del acuerdo de la subvención
MICINN/Programa Nacional de Proyectos de Investigación Fundamental/AGL2008-03729/ES/INCORPORACION DE FUENTES DE FIBRA NO FORRAJERA EN RACIONES MIXTAS COMPLETAS PARA TERNEROS EN CEBO INTENSIVO/
Program
Qualitat i Tecnologia Alimentària
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